Flirting With Pete: A Novel (35 page)

“You thought you could change him.”

“No,” Ruth corrected patiently. “I thought he was different.” She grew introspective again. “But the times were different, too. Back then, we met, dated a little while, decided to get married, and just did it. We made the decision as much on practical matters as love. When I met Connie, he was already a well-respected professor, already published many times over. Yes, he was painfully shy, but I found that endearing. More important, he offered me a financial stability that I wanted.” She smiled. “I wanted to paint, but I didn’t want to starve while I did it. Also, quite honestly, I didn’t want to be bothered while I painted, so the fact that Connie had his own busy professional life appealed to me.”

“And love?”

“I loved Connie. The more I learned about him, the more I loved him.” She held up a hand. “Yes, I know that sounds strange, but don’t you see? Connie was a victim of a childhood that scarred him badly.”

“Did he never have therapy for that?”

Ruth shook her head. “An irony, isn’t it? He’s the doctor who can’t hear of being a patient. Had he been a psychiatrist, he might have been forced to have therapy. But it wasn’t required for his degree, and he didn’t seek it out on his own.”

“It was too threatening.”

“Far too threatening. I used to suggest it. Way back, when I didn’t know whether to divorce him or just move out, I told him he needed it. I told him he was missing out on good things in life. I offered to see a therapist
with
him.” She gave a quick headshake. “
Far
too threatening. So I did move out— and, lo and behold, our relationship improved.”

“Connie was less threatened.”

“In fairness, I was better, too. My expectations changed. As soon as I accepted him for what he could and could not do, I was fine.”

“But… living apart from your husband all these years?”

Ruth smiled. “I have friends. I have not been lonely. Besides, you may be too young to understand this, but there are scores of women who would find separate living an ideal situation. I got the best of my husband, along with all the freedom in the world.”

“But no kids,” Casey pointed out.

Ruth eyed her directly. “I can’t have kids. I knew that before I was married.”

Casey felt instant remorse. “I’m sorry.”

“Things happen for the best. I’ve had a rich life. I sometimes fantasize about having had a daughter, but we might as easily have been at each other’s throats as not. I have nieces and nephews, and now grands of each.”

That raised another issue. “In the townhouse, the spare bedrooms upstairs?” Casey asked. “What’s their purpose?”

Ruth smiled gently, said quietly, “Dreams. Connie did dream of lots of things. You might not believe this, but many of those dreams revolved around you.”

A flash of anger returned. “Why couldn’t he pick up the phone?” Casey cried, and in the next breath answered herself. “Fear. Fear of rejection.”

“Fear of failure.”

Casey suffered from that herself, but she had never guessed it of Connie. “Failure?”

“Fear that he’d be a lousy father. He might not have had therapy, but he did know his limitations.”

“And he couldn’t get past them?” Casey asked in a last-ditch attempt at criticism— because her heart had indeed softened. It had softened toward Ruth, who was no longer just a name and a face, but had become very real, very sympathetic, even likable. And it had softened toward Connie.

“No. He couldn’t get past them.”

“But he knew about me. He knew where I was and what I was doing.”

“Yes.”

“Did he care?”

“He left you the townhouse. He loved that place, truly loved it. He could have had it sold and given the proceeds to charity, but he gave it to you. So you tell me. Did he care?”

Casey couldn’t answer. Her throat was too tight.

Ruth rescued her. “He cared. Believe me. He cared. Connie had feelings just like you and I do. He just expressed them differently. In my case, it was calling me at six in the evening, every single day that we weren’t together, to make sure that I was all right. In your case, it was decorating the townhouse in a way he thought you might like. Yes, he did that. In your mother’s case, it’s the flowers.”

“Flowers?”

“He has fresh ones delivered to her room every week.”

“No,” Casey said. “The nursing home does that.”

Slowly, conclusively, Ruth shook her head. And suddenly it made sense. Casey had never seen flowers in the rooms of other long-term patients. Nor would the nurses be remarking on the flowers, as they so often did, if flowers were just another part of the package. Casey had just assumed…

Casey had hit a jackpot in her scavenger hunt for learning who Connie was, yet she left Rockport feeling deflated. In learning so much, she had given up a lot. How to be angry at Ruth? She wasn’t the enemy. How even to be angry at Connie? He was a victim in his own right.

But Casey needed an enemy. She needed someone to blame for Connie being Connie, for Caroline being unresponsive, for the call earlier that morning, wondering if she had made a decision about the teaching position in Providence— which she had not, she explained, and begged for more time. A definite answer by Monday? Yes, she could do that.

No enemy there. The department had to offer the job to another therapist if Casey turned it down. They were under pressure, too. She couldn’t find fault with them.

Who, then, to blame for the ills of the world? Darden Clyde was a fair candidate, and she did have a lead. Abbott, Maine. It might not be Little Falls, but it was a place to start. She planned to do that first thing in the morning.

More immediately, though, there was Jordan. She could be angry at Jordan. He hadn’t been in the garden that morning, though it was Friday and he was due. She had done an extra-long yoga routine just in case, but no Jordan, and that worried her. He might have come while she was in Rockport; she knew instinctively that he wouldn’t neglect the garden. But
she
was not the garden. She was a thinking, feeling human being with whom he was doing some very intimate things. Yet he hadn’t shown up Thursday night— hadn’t come by, hadn’t called, hadn’t held her.

Of course, he had no obligation to do any of those things. They weren’t really friends. She could barely call them lovers. Those very intimate things they did together? Sex. That was all it was. Sex. She knew next to nothing about him.

Suddenly that felt wrong. So she drove straight back to the townhouse, feeling anticipation the closer she got. She was trying to decide whether the anticipation had to do with seeing Jordan or coming home— an amazing thought,
that
one— when she pulled down the back alley into view of the parking space behind the garden. Jordan’s Jeep wasn’t there.

Disappointed, she took a quick look inside the garden, just in case— and there was definitely a sense of the familiar now. Unable to resist, she went inside and stood in the woodsy part. If she moved in close to the hemlocks so that she saw nothing but green fronds, and if she then inhaled, she might well have been in the midst of a forest; the sensory effect was the same. Nature was a potent drug. God as clinician, she thought with a smile. Divine aromatherapy.

Feeling calmer, she set off on foot for Daisy’s Mum, heading for the address that had been printed on the receipts for the checks Connie had written. It was an easy walk past brownstones, lindens, and window-box geraniums, down West Cedar to Revere, then down Revere to the tiny side street just shy of Charles. The store was the only one amid a handful of townhouses, but, even aside from the customers who browsed on the sidewalk, there was no missing it. A long awning stretched over its front windows and doors; it was striped, burgundy and white to complement the brick of the neighboring townhouses, but the crowd of plants that lay under the awning put those townhouses’ window boxes to shame. The plants in front, bathed in sun, offered a profusion of flowers in bright yellows, whites, purples, and blues. A handful of other flowering plants hung in the shade of the awning, along with dozens of green plants.

The fragrance of the flowers lured Casey forward. Inside, she found a surprisingly small space with a stone floor and walls, stacks of decorative pots, and a bevy of garden sculptures. The plants here were green; color came from cut flowers that stood, grouped in kind, in tin vases of various sizes and heights. A stone slab marked the checkout counter. Behind it, writing out a sales slip, was a pretty woman wearing a white cotton shirt and jeans— Daisy herself, judging from her sense of command. She looked to be in her mid-forties.

Casey waited her turn without any feeling of impatience. Though the store was a fraction of the size of her own garden, it conveyed the same sense of peace. Plants did that, she decided. They were natural and beautiful. Aside from the poison ivy type, they weren’t hurtful as humans could be.

“May I help you?” Daisy asked.

Casey stepped up to the counter. “I’m Casey Ellis, Connie Unger’s daughter. Are you Daisy?”

The woman broke into a broad smile. “I am,” she said, and held out a hand. “I’m so pleased to meet you. We adored your father.” Her smile faded. “I was so sorry to hear about his death. He was a very sweet person.”

Casey nodded. “He left me the townhouse. I just wanted to tell you how spectacular the garden is.”

Daisy smiled again. “Thank you. That was Jordan’s doing.”

“Is he here?”

“Now? No. He should be back soon, though. I know that he has to clean up for an appointment at four.” She tossed a glance at the ceiling. “His phone’s been ringing.”

Casey mirrored the tossed glance. “Is that the office?”

“Oh, no. He lives up there.”

“Ah.”

“It’s so much better having someone right here. He answers the phone off-hours and all.”

“Ah.”

“I believe he was hitting your place after his appointment. Would you like me to leave him a message?”

“Nah,” Casey said with a casual shake of her head. “It was nothing important. I’ll catch him when he’s at the house. I’m glad I stopped by, though. The shop is a delight.” She took a business card from the holder by the register. It had the name of the shop drawn in elegant scrollwork. “Really pretty.”

Daisy smiled. “Thanks. Stop by again.”

“Will do.” Casey slipped the card into her pocket and went out the door feeling that the shop, and Daisy, were new friends.

As she headed back toward the townhouse, though, her thoughts turned to Jordan. Funny. She had assumed that her garden was the focus of his day. Naturally, she had wanted to think that. Seeing the flower shop, though, feeling the buzz of activity, hearing Daisy talk about phone calls and appointments, she realized that she was only one of the stops he made in his day. He was a busy man. He had a whole other life that had nothing to do with her garden.

Well, so did she.

She gave him one last chance. When she arrived at the townhouse, though, and found him nowhere in sight, she went inside and put overnight things in her gym bag along with the three installments of
Flirting with Pete
. She spoke softly with Angus for a minute from the door to Connie’s room. She told Meg that she might not be back for a day or two. She stopped in at Connie’s office for a map.

Then she put her bag in the trunk of the Miata, climbed inside, and headed for Maine.

The farther Casey drove from Boston, the more urgency she felt. Caroline was laboring for breath again; Casey called en route and learned that. The doctors were monitoring her for signs of infection. In patients like Caroline, infection was one of the major causes of death.

Casey debated turning around and driving back. But she couldn’t bear feeling useless— still, yet, again. Besides, if Caroline had taught her anything, it was to act on her beliefs. She might not approve of Casey’s cause, but she would approve of Casey’s going after it. Connie, conversely, would approve of the cause— at least, the part of it that involved Jenny Clyde.

It wasn’t often that Casey had the approval of both of her parents, and this felt right. She couldn’t back off now.

So she kept her foot on the gas and the car headed north. An hour into the drive, she passed through the southeast corner of New Hampshire. By then, she had returned a call to one of her yoga friends, who was concerned when she hadn’t shown up at class the night before, and to a client who wanted to reschedule an appointment.

When she entered Maine, the highway opened up. A number of cars turned off at the outlet stores in Kittery, then again at the Ogunquit exits, then again when she hit Portland, but by the time she passed the two-hour mark, even Portland was behind her.

She stopped, filled the car with gas, checked the map, and drove on. By the time she reached Augusta, three hours had passed, she had picked up a new client through a referral, and, phone calls notwithstanding, she was tired of the highway. It was another hour yet, though, before she reached Bangor. At that point, she left the highway, trading speed for interest. The road north now had one lane in each direction. As fate had it, she ended up behind a rusted pickup with Maine plates, going on the slow side of thirty miles an hour.

She ruled out honking as a city thing. She ruled out passing as suicidal. More wisely, she executed a few deep yoga breaths, paced herself comfortably behind the pickup, and took in the scenery. Pines and firs hugged the sides of the road, greens and blues in such subtle variations that the palette was entirely soothing. She passed the occasional open field with a farmhouse, lean-to, or garage. She passed the occasional little home so neatly tucked into the woods that she wouldn’t have seen it had she been driving faster. She passed the occasional lake.

She nearly missed Abbott. Forty minutes off the highway as she cruised at under thirty miles an hour, it was little more than a bump in the road that included a Grange Hall, a post office, and a convenience store. Famished by now, she pulled up in front of the store. Three boys in their late teens, wearing earrings, tattoos, and evil-looking tee shirts, slouched on a bench in front cupping cigarettes in their hands, as though tendrils of smoke, alone, wouldn’t give them away.